This book, a collaborative project based on the extensive previous work in the field of the three authors, is an attempt to produce a comprehensive and coherent typology for describing complex codices. While the most obvious aim of this book is to offer an extensive tool for manuscript cataloguing, it is also meant and will likely prove quite useful in all connected fields. Indeed, there are well known difficulties in describing complex manuscripts in biblical studies as well—for instance the generalised use of the ever-ambiguous ‘miscellany’ term—where a plus of specificity as well as descriptions up to date with technical codicological terminology would be welcome. Read the rest of this entry »

This volume grew out of the conference organised in April 2008 in Oxford at Lincoln College and, as the title indicates, it is the Festschrift offered to Prof. Christopher Tuckett. It is also meant to commemorate on the centenary of, and bring up to date, the volume Oxford Studies in the Synoptic Problem, edited in 1911 by William Sanday, the then Lady Margaret Professor of Divinity at Oxford. This book gathers thirty-three commissioned contributions, grouped in five parts of varying size. I have presented elsewhere the twenty two papers offered at the conference in 2008 (here). In the following I shall be presenting the remaining commissioned contributions, largely in the same manner. Read the rest of this entry »

A fairly recent growing interest in biblical studies pertains to ideology, culture and translation, resulting in a series of studies on various more or less ideological biases in both antique and modern translations of the Bible. This volume offers a study on possible ideological biases in Romanian translations of the New Testament, from the 16th century to 2007. The title may be translated as Dilemmas of Fidelity: Cultural and Theological Conditioning in Bible Translations, and it is a revised version of Contac’s PhD thesis at the University of Bucharest (2010).

The study seeks to identify the reasons for which a translation can depart from the Biblical text (the infidelity suggested in the title) and is meant to provide a better established basis for further NT translations in Romanian; it that sense, it also attempts to propose translation solutions that might be acceptable to the various confessional bodies in Romania. Read the rest of this entry »

Many thanks to Instituto Papirologico “Vitelli” for providing a review copy.

Stemming from the 2010 annual colloquium of Instituto Papirologico “Vitelli” held ten years after Mario Naldini’s passing away, this volume is a Gedenkschrift in his memory. The first paper, “Mario Naldini e la Papirologia,” is signed by Carlo Nardi and offers both a laudatio and a presentation of his life and works, especially related to early Christianity and papyrology.

BibleWorks is a rather visible product on the market of biblical softwares. The 9th version, reviewed here, offers a number of added elements, both in content and to the interface. With respect to the latter, among other features: a fourth column, a verse tab displaying critical notes or a critical apparatus for the verse under the mouse, a tagging tool for Greek NT morphology; I would also mention the set of transcription tools and search tools, which supports the new text-critical element of this software. With respect to content, BibleWorks 9 offers several additional modern Bible versions, the Robinson-Pierpont Byzantine text with morphology, the Loeb Classical Edition versification for Josephus, the Moody Atlas of the Bible, and others.

For the present reviewer, the most important additions are the New Testament critical apparatus produced by the CNTTS (Center for New Testament Textual Studies) and the (first) results of the BibleWorks Manuscript Project; together, they open a whole new venue for the utilisation of this product.

This volume is the revised and amplified version of a PhD thesis written under Alexander Golitzin and defended in 2007 at Marquette University. From the outset, Bucur’s research on angelomorphic pneumatology (“that is, the use of angelic imagery in early Christian discourse about the Holy Spirit”, xxi) is proposed “as a complement to Charles Gieschen’s work on angelomorphic Christology and to John Levinson’s work on the angelic spirit in early Judaism” (xi). Read the rest of this entry »

This volume is intended as a papyrological follow-up of a previous volume, New Testament Manuscripts: Their Texts and Their World, published in the same series (TENT 2) in 2006. It features nine articles forming nine chapters varying in size between 15 and 45 pages. Read the rest of this entry »

This is a stirring small volume from a prominent papyrologist, containing the published form of four lectures offered in May 2006 at the École Practique des Haute Études of Paris, which were published simultaneously in French (with Droz, see here). Read the rest of this entry »

This is Hugh Houghton’s response in the review-session dedicated to his Augustine’s Text of John, at the International Medieval Congress, Leeds, July 2010, (session 1630). The two reviews, signed by Cornelia Linde and Dan Batovici are available here and here.

First of all, I’d like to thank Cornelia and Dan for the time they’ve spent preparing for this session and for their very detailed and careful reviews: it has been a real pleasure to hear such constructive engagement with the text. Read the rest of this entry »

Follow Blog via Email

Biblical and Early Christian Studies

2019.9.9 | Jennifer Knust and Tommy Wasserman. To Cast the First Stone: The Transmission of a Gospel Story. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2019. Review by Garrick V. Allen, Dublin City University. This meticulously researched and deeply engaging volume on the pericopeadulterae(PA) is a prime example of the value of collaborative research in the humanities, encompassing […]

2019.4.5 | Edward Lipiński. A History of the Kingdom of Israel. Orientalia Lovaniensia Analecta 275. Leuven: Peeters, 2018. ISBN: 978-90-429-3655-3. pp. xii+209. Review by Kurtis Peters, University of British Columbia Histories of Israel have become commonplace. The topic of Israel’s history has always intrigued scholars and many have undertaken to reconstruct their own version of that history. […]

2019.1.2 | Rollston, Christopher, A. Enemies and Friends of the State: Ancient Prophecy in Context. University Park: Eisenbrauns, 2018. pp. X + 613. ISBN: 9781575067643. Reviewed by Kurtis Peters The biblical prophets and their historical personae have long fascinated readers of the Bible, scholars and non-scholars alike. They are dramatic; their words both condemn and offer […]

2018.12.13 | Göran Eidevall.Amos: A New Translation with Introduction and Commentary. Anchor Yale Bible 24G. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2017. pp. xx + 292. ISBN: 978-0-300-17878-4. Reviewed by Kurtis Peters Göran Eidevall has contributed the new Amos volume in the expanding Anchor Yale Bible commentary series. This commentary is the successor to the original […]